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Second Half by MHSAA

Is a Future Possible?

September 8, 2011

While interviewing candidates for a staff position, we posed the question:  “What will school sports look like a generation from now?”  And we followed up with:  “What will the MHSAA need to do to be of relevant service in that future?”

In a follow-up interview with one of the leading candidates, when I invited questions, that candidate turned the tables and asked me what I thought school sports and the MHSAA would look like in 10 or 20 years.

These exchanges, and all that has been changing as school districts chop away at school budgets and programs, has me wondering if a future is possible for school sports.  But the answer is almost certainly “Yes.” 

School sports have survived two World Wars, the Korean War and Vietnam, as well as the Great Depression and multiple recessions.  School sports has existed before and after interstates and the Internet, before and after suburban sprawl and space exploration, before and after television and Twitter, before and after . . . well, you get the point.

Will school sports change?  Certainly.  But if history is a good indicator, it will change more slowly than the society around it.  And many people will cherish that gap.

Rocket Science

January 5, 2015

I have always been fascinated by space exploration and in awe of all that is required and must go right to send a space vehicle atop a multi-stage booster rocket from a moving object like Earth, and land it softly on another moving object like the moon or Mars or most recently a massive rock, after a journey of many months and millions of miles. How can people figure that stuff out?
There cannot be a problem of school sports that is more complicated than those of space exploration, except for one feature – which is that our problems deal with people, who are far less predictable and dependable than the laws of physics.
Making matters worse is that we are working with people in a competitive arena, and in an emotional setting, where the objectivity which characterizes the scientific method of rocket scientists is generally if not universally absent.
As long as potential problem-solvers view potential solutions through the lens of what does or does not benefit them in terms of competitive edge, our efforts to make good changes will never launch or, if launched, will miss the target.